This project grew out of Yarra City Council’s desire to know more about the role previous Councils in the area played in the dispossession of the Aboriginal population. These Councils included the Town (and later) City of Melbourne, as well as the Cities of Fitzroy, Collingwood and Richmond. The intention was to promote Reconciliation based on a better understanding of historical events.

The research undertaken for this project has determined that these Councils, as governmental bodies, had little to no direct role in this dispossession. Laws and actions relating to the Aboriginal people came from the Colonial Government of New South Wales until 1851 and, after that, the Colonial Government of Victoria. Municipal councils were created by the request of the local population, after the European population in each area had reached a certain level, meaning that dispossession had already occurred.

However, Council still formed a part of the larger society and contributed to the dispossession. By exploring the relationships between European people with the Aboriginal people, particularly the Wurundjeri-willam of the Kulin nation, we hope to show the many ways in which the arrival of European people in this area disrupted the lives of the Indigenous population. In promoting ownership of this difficult history, we hope to deepen understanding within non-Aboriginal communities, and advance healing processes within the Aboriginal communities.

A note to sources:

Given the time frame and availability of source material, this research has been conducted predominantly using secondary source materials, and the information and interpretation contained in them. A notable exception was the examination of the Notice Papers and Proceedings of Council, and where appropriate the Council Minutes, for the Cities of Melbourne, Fitzroy, Collingwood and Richmond.

Source Material

Primary Source Material

Minute Book of Council Meetings, Public Records Office Victoria, VPRS, 8910, P0001, Unit 1-2

Notice Papers (Municipality of Fitzroy), Public Records Office Victoria, VPRS 15744, P0001, Unit 1-2

Notice Papers and Proceedings of the Council, Public Records Office Victoria, VPRS 54, P0001, Volume 1-9

Notices of Motion, P0001, Public Records Office Victoria, VPRS15748, Unit 1

Town Clerk’s Files, Series I (1842-1910),  Public Records Office Victoria, VPRS 3181, P0000, Unit 12 – Statistics

Report of the Select Committee of the Legislative Council on The Aborigines; Together with the Proceedings of Committee, Minutes of Evidence, and Appendices, Melbourne: John Ferres, Government Printer 1859

Jones, Pauline (ed.), Historical Records of Victoria: Volume One: Beginnings of Permanent Government, Melbourne: Victorian Government Printing Office, 1981.

Secondary Source Material

Barrett, Bernard, The Inner Suburbs: The Evolution of an Industrial Area, Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1971.

Blainey, Geoffrey, A Land Half Won, South Melbourne: Macmillan Company, 1980

Blaskett, Beverley A., ‘The Aboriginal response to white settlement in the Port Phillip district, 1835-1850’, M.A. Thesis, University of Melbourne, 1979

Boyce, James, 1835: The Founding of Melbourne & The Conquest of Australia, Collingwood: Black Ink., 2011

Brown-May, Andrew, and Swain, Shurlee (eds), The Encyclopedia of  Melbourne, online edition, www.emelbourne.net.au, accessed 28/11/11

Canning, Shaun, and Thiele, Frances, Indigenous Cultural heritage and History within the Metropolitan Melbourne Investigation Area: A Report to the Victorian Environmental Assessment Council, Australian Cultural Heritage Management, 2010

Christie, M.F., Aborigines in Colonial Victoria 1835-86, Sydney: Sydney University Press, 1979

Clark, Ian D., and Kostanski, Laura M., ‘An Indigenous History of Stonnington – A report to the City of Stonnington’ (2006).

Edmonds, Penelope, ‘The Intimate Urbanising Frontier: Native Camps and Settler Colonialism’s Violent Array of Spaces around Early Melbourne’, in Banivanua Mar, Tracey, and Edmonds, Penelope (eds), Making Settler Colonial Space: Perspectives on Race, Place and Identity, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010

Edmonds, Penelope, Urbanizing Frontiers: Indigenous Peoples and Settlers in 19th Century Pacific Rim Cities, Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2010

Eidelson, Meyer, The Melbourne Dreaming: A Guide to the Aboriginal Places of Melbourne, Canberrra, Aborignal Studies Press, 1997

Ellender, Isabel, and Christiansen, Peter, People of the Merri Merri: The Wurundjeri in Colonial Days, Melbourne: Merri Creek Management Committee, 2001

Finn, Edmund, The Chronicles of Early Melbourne, 1835-1852: Historical, Anecdotal and Personal, by “Garryowen”, Centennial edition, Melbourne: Fergusson and Mitchell, 1888

Garden, Don, Victoria: A History, Melbourne: Thomas Nelson Australia, 1984

Golding, D.J. (ed.), The Emigrant’s Guide to Australia in the Eighteen Fifties, Melbourne: The Hawthorn Press, 1973

Goulding, Megan, and Menis, Mary, Moreland Post-Contact Aboriginal Heritage Study, Prepared for Moreland City Council, North Carlton: Goulding Heritage Consulting, April 2006

Macneil, Rod, ‘Time After Time: Temporal Frontiers and Boundaries in Colonial Images of the Australian Landscape’, in Lynette Russell (ed), Colonial Frontiers: Indigenous-European Encounters in Settler Societies, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001

Presland, Gary, First People: The Eastern Kulin of Melbourne, Port Phillip and Central Victoria, Melbourne: Museum Victoria, 2010

Public Records Office Victoria (PROV) Information Sheets – ‘Municipalities’; ‘PROV Guide 64 – Land, Place and Local History – City of Melbourne’; PROV Guide 65 – Koorie Heritage – Aboriginal Records at PROV’; Function VF175: Aboriginal Affairs

Sullivan, Martin, Men & Women of Port Phillip, Marrickville: Hale & Ironmonger, 1985